Myths Made Plain

If you're wondering how we landed here
You were watching the waves and drinking beer
You don't even remember standing up
Truly, I don't either
At some point, you waded to your waist
As you slipped further out, the stakes were raised
Finally, you were surrounded--and for what?--
By water, darker and deeper
In 1997, I became myself
And twenty minutes later, I began to melt
A cycle I'd get used to in the course of time
The shifting definitions that comprise a life
The people I become, the people I don't recognize
If you're wondering who arranged the mess
Some exceptions were made, I grant, I guess
While we yawned at the peak of the parade
The underbelly went lethal
In 2007, tried to build a bridge
Between how I was living and how I could live
I tricked myself in thinking that I'd done enough
And once I got across, I didn't blow it up
And yeah, I closed some lanes, but all it really takes is one
Opening to tear apart all your work, so finely wrought
Delicate, unachieved, all your high philosophy
Style points, blind belief, a world in perpetuity
That owes you more than those that did the same before
So in 2017, we did away with "facts"
And all negotiation with the battle axe
Through gruesome ideology--a sin! a shame!--
The American identity was laid to waste
Or blacklit and exposed, sugar-stripped and myths made plain
The people I become are people I can't replicate